Haaretz: Telephone call stopped imminent Israeli-Iranian war

Isreali newspaper Haaretz revealed that Russian President Vladimir Putin stopped an imminent Israeli-Iranian war, with a telephone call, following recent escalation. This weekend Israel shot down an Iranian drone over the occupied Palestinian territories and then later had a Israeli F-16 fighter shot down over Syria.

The newspaper described the call between Putin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, on Sunday evening, as “decisive and fateful as it immediately stopped the escalation.”

The newspaper concluded that the Russian President provided an acceptable solution to both conflicting parties, and pointed out that this is a clear conclusion which can be drawn from the sequence of events on Saturday, as translated by Arabi21.

The newspaper also said that the Israeli raids on targets in Syria raised Moscow’s concerns, since they have targeted locations close to the areas of spread of Russian advisers, especially at Tiyas Military Airbase (T-4 Airbase) in the eastern countryside of Homs.

The newspaper concluded that the stability that prevailed in the region after the telephone conversation between Putin and Netanyahu has revealed again the real decision maker in the Middle East. The newspaper stressed that Russia decides how things should turn out in the region while the United States is still an “absent-present” party in the scenes.

According to a statement the Kremlin has issued, after the telephone conversation on Saturday, Putin called on Netanyahu to refrain from taking any steps that may lead to a new round of serious confrontations in the region.

The Israeli ambassador in Moscow has called on both Russia and the United States to urgently intervene to contain the situation, and prevent Syria from becoming “a bridge through which Iran passes to (Israel).”

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